TestPrep-Online’s UCAT Tutorial

Solve Smart:

Know the Test &

Manage Your Time
Table of Contents

Introduction............................................................................................................................... 3
Important to Remember About UCAT....................................................................................... 3
Set Your Mind to a Rapid Working Pace ................................................................................ 3
Smartly Navigate through Test Questions............................................................................. 3
Inability to Revisit Previous Questions .................................................................................. 4
No Penalty for Wrong Answers ............................................................................................. 4
Questions Become Increasingly Difficult as the Test Progresses .......................................... 4
Shortcuts: How to Save Precious Time ...................................................................................... 4
Solving questions directly ...................................................................................................... 4
Eliminating Distracters .......................................................................................................... 4
Working With Numbers Quickly ................................................................................................ 5
First - Digit Technique............................................................................................................ 5
Complex Fractions Calculations ............................................................................................. 6
Calculations with Decimals .................................................................................................... 6
Last – Digit Technique ........................................................................................................... 7
Using Estimations ...................................................................................................................... 8
Another Methodology concerning Estimations – Using an "Anchor" ................................... 9
Introduction

One of the main challenges of the UCAT test is its time limit. In this exam you only
have 20 minutes to solve 40 questions. Very few people actually get through all 40
questions, but nonetheless you will have to work at a very quick pace in order to
achieve a high score.

Important to Remember About UCAT

Set Your Mind to a Rapid Working Pace

Working at a quick pace does not simply depend only on your cognitive abilities and
your knowledge, but also on your motivation and your state of mind during the test,
two factors which you can also affect and control (besides studying and improving
your knowledge). This can be compared to walking vs. sprint running. When moving
around we are used to a normal comfortable pace and normally walk, but if we want
we can of course move at a higher speed. On this test you need to adopt a "sprint
running" attitude, which means trying to work as fast as you can, while of course
taking care not to make careless mistakes.

You can practice this state of mind while reading a text. Go back to the beginning of
this paragraph and try to read it as quickly as possible while still maintaining
understanding of the material. It is most likely that you will see that your speed can
substantially increase without hindering your understanding if you just set your mind
to this “quick as possible” attitude. Of course, as mentioned before, careless
mistakes should be avoided. If you find yourself making too many of these, you
should probably slow down a bit and try to maintain a high level of concentration
while working.

Smartly Navigate through Test Questions

Another important dimension in time management is not to get stuck on difficult
questions. If you encounter a question that is taking you too long and you have no
idea how to approach it, or you estimate that a question is difficult and will be too
much time consuming, you should consider skipping it. All questions on the UCAT
are of the same value, thus, your goal is to answer as many questions correctly as
possible, regardless of how challenging the questions are. Of course, deciding when
and if to skip a question is not an exact science, but you can improve your judgment
on this issue using our practice tests.
Inability to Revisit Previous Questions
It is important to note that on the UCAT you will not be able to return to previous
questions. Given this fact, it is important not to skip too many questions and finish
the test with time to spare, while remaining careful not to get stuck on any question
for too long. The general rule of thumb is: if after 10 seconds you are not progressing
towards answering the question within another 20 seconds, eliminate as many
wrong answers as you can, guess, and move on.

No Penalty for Wrong Answers

Time is nearly ending? Do not forget to mark all questions with an answer, even
when not knowing the answer! Remember that even a random answer still has 20%
of being correct. Try to increase these chances by making educated guesses (find
below more about working with distracters and the elimination process)

Questions Become Increasingly Difficult as the Test Progresses

Generally speaking, the level of difficulty increases throughout the test, thus, most of
the difficult questions are found near its end. However, this is not a hard and fast
rule and sometimes easier questions can appear at later stages and difficult ones can
appear at earlier ones. So, you should be prepared to judge a question’s difficulty
quickly and determine if you should skip it or try to solve it.

Shortcuts: How to Save Precious Time

As mentioned, one of the main challenges we are faced with when taking this test is
keeping up with the difficult time limit. Improving our speed is critical, and in order
to solve quicker we can utilize a few shortcuts when faced with relatively difficult
calculations. Sometimes applying these techniques can save us time even when the
question is relatively easy.

Solving questions directly

It is always preferred to estimate whether you can directly solve each question or
not. That is, if you understand the question simply move on to solving it and then
look for your answer. Finding a match may indicate high probability that your answer
is correct.
However, it is still a good idea to have at least a glance at the other answer choices,
since they may tell you quite a lot, as specified in the next section
Eliminating Distracters
Distracters are the incorrect answer choices for each question. Their name implies
their role in the test: To distract the test taker from choosing the correct answer. The
distracters for each question were deliberately chosen by the test writer, and do not
just represent wrong answer choices. Usually, one or two distracters are very
misleading, or present an outcome of an incorrect solution path. Your goal is to
locate them and eliminate them.
In some cases, knowing how to read and interpret the distracters might save your
precious time. The distracters can sometimes imply how to bypass some more
complex calculations.

The two most important principles of elimination are:

1. Once an answer choice is eliminated, it shouldn't be addressed any longer.

2. Once all answer choices but one are eliminated, you should mark the last
option as the correct answer and move forward to the next question.
Verifying the verity of the last possible option, while possibly relaxing, is still
time-consuming, thus we recommend not doing it.

The most obvious way of elimination is to test each answer choice as the correct
answer by means of calculation. However, in most cases this is also the most time-
consuming method. Here are a few methods that will improve your process of
elimination:

Working With Numbers Quickly

First - Digit Technique

Check the following question:

There are 803 boxes in storage; each box contains 62 cellphone covers. How many
cellphone covers are there in storage?

A. 49786
B. 49788
C. 46206
D. 46208

None of the answers strikes at first as the obvious correct answer. The first digits of
83 x 62 are 8 and 6. The product of 8x6 is 48. Therefore, according to the first-digit
technique we can tell that the correct answer must be above 48000:

803 x 62 is greater than 800 x 60. This product equals 48000.

This method enables us to further eliminate options C and D; since they are lower
than 48000.
Complex Fractions Calculations
Consider the next question:

I'm cycling for 23 2/5 miles so far, and I still have 7 4/5 in front of me. How many
miles will I cycle in total?

A. 93 1/5
B. 31 1/5
C. 30 2/5
D. 15 3/5

Performing calculation with fractions is a bit more complex than without them;
however sometimes we don't need to perform the entire calculation. Adding solely
the fractions of both elements may help us to solve the question faster:

23 2/5 + 7 4/5  

2/5 + 4/5 = 6/5 = 1 1/5 

Hence, the correct answer must end with 1/5. Reviewing the answer choices reveals
that only options A and B end with 1/5, thus options C and D are eliminated. By
estimation (see more below) we can tell that option A suggest a result which is too
high, and we can mark option B as the correct answer and move forward.

Calculations with Decimals

Same as with fractions, we can reduce calculation time and eliminate some (or even
all) answer choices by addressing only the decimal part of the elements in a
question. Per example:

The coat costs $103. How much does it cost after a 10% discount?

A. 92.7$
B. 93.0$
C. 88.6$
D. 93.3$

Glancing at the answer choices reveals that all options have different figures in their
decimal part: $92.7,$93.0, $88.6, $90.3

We calculate 10% of 103 to be 10.3. Now we need to deduct 10.3 from 103 to find
the price after the discount:

103 is a natural number with no decimal part. The decimal part of 10.3 is of course .3

If we understand that reducing a 10.3 from a natural number must result in a

number which its decimal part is .7, then only option A remains as a suitable answer,
and all other option are eliminated. Again, the complete calculation was not
necessary, and moreover – completing the calculation to verify the verity of the
answer will only consume our precious time.

Last – Digit Technique

Let's take a look at the following question:

6582 × 823 = ?

1. 4,876,312

2. 8,234,313

3. 5,220,411

4. 5,416,986

At first glance, this question looks quite unsolvable, at least not in a reasonable
amount of time, but actually it's quite simple and can be solved in a few seconds.

When numbers are multiplied, the product of their last digits' multiplication will be
the last digit of the answer. To understand this principle, let's take another look at
the question, focusing on the last digits:

6582 × 823 = ?

When multiplying 2 and 3 we get 6. Therefore, the answer's last digit will also be 6. A
look at the answers reveals that there is only one answer choice that abides to this
rule, answer number 4. Therefore, we don’t really need to calculate anything besides
2 times 3!

1. 4,876,312

2. 8,234,313

3. 5,220,411

4. 5,416,986

If multiplying the last digits yields a number that is greater than 9, we simply use the
last digit of that number, for example:

647 × 322 =
Since 7 × 12 = 14 we will expect the answer's last digit to be 4 (the last digit of 14).

Although it is very unlikely that we will encounter calculations as difficult as the ones
in the above example, this technique can be just as useful in simpler, more common
calculations. For example:

A paper clip costs $0.88. How much does a pack of 6 cost?

1. $5.22

2. $4.86

3. $5.28

4. $5.70

Although this calculation is not too complicated, we can save time by using the last
digit technique:

The calculation we are required to do is $0.88 × 6 = ?

Because 8 × 6 = 48, we expect the last digit of the answer to be 8. Therefore, the
correct answer will be answer number 3.

Using Estimations

Another technique we can use to avoid unnecessary calculations is estimations.

When confronted with a calculation which is relatively difficult we can:

1. Round up the numbers to figures which are more comfortable to work with.

2. Estimate the expected answer.

3. Rule out the unlikely answers, hopefully remaining with only one option left.

Let’s take a look at the Following example to see how this works:

Larry invested a third of his $6,216 earnings in the stock market. What was the size
of his investment?

1. $879

2. $2,072
3. $2,804

4. $3,120

In order to avoid calculating 6,216/3, we can round down 6,216 to 6,000, a relatively
close number which is easier to work with. 6,000/3 = 2000. Since the original number
was 6,216, we can estimate that the answer would be slightly above $2,000.
Reviewing the options available, we can immediately rule out answers 1 & 4. Since
answer 3 is too far from 2000 to be in our estimation range, we can safely conclude
that the correct answer would be $2072, answer number 2.

In this example, the answers were quite spread apart in size, making it easier for us
to estimate, but what if the answers were closer to each other?

We can take the estimation process a step further by splitting up $6,216 into
6000+216. 216 is pretty close to 210, which we can divide by 3 quite easily: 210/3 =
70 (it is enough to remember from the multiplication table that 21/3 = 7).

Thus, if 6,000/3 = 2,000, and210/3 = 70

We can add them up to 2070, and get an even more accurate estimation.

To sum this up, when estimating we can:

a. Begin with a quick rough estimation.

b. If that is not sufficient to rule out all answers but one, move on to a more accurate
estimation.

c. If that is not enough, we will have to calculate.

Of course there could be questions in which estimating will not be necessary,

because the calculations required will be relatively easy. Still, we should always keep
this technique in mind and apply it whenever it can be useful in improving our
efficiency and saving us precious time.

Another Methodology concerning Estimations – Using an "Anchor"

Consider the following question:

Which of the following fractions is the smallest?

A. 3/7
B. 1/3
C. 5/6
 D. 9/14

The most straight forward method to solve this problem is to perform a series of
comparisons between the fractions – for each comparison to find a common
denominator and then to decide which fraction is smaller and compare it to the next
option. We can use estimations to narrow the number of comparisons. How?

An "anchor" is a relatively familiar and "comfortable" number that we can use in

order to divide certain options into groups. In out particular problem 1/2 can be
used as an anchor. It is easier to ask ourselves which of the fraction is higher/lower
than 1/2, than to compare all of them one to the other.

3/7 and 1/3 are lower than 1/2. 5/6 and 9/14 are higher than 1/2. We need to find
the smallest fraction, so being lower than 1/2, it is enough to compare 3/7 and 1/3
to find the smallest fraction. We used our "anchor" to reduce the number of
"uncomfortable" comparisons.

Another example:

How much are 216% of 350?

A. 696
B. 702
C. 756
D. 932

216% of "y" are actually "y" times 2.16.

The full solution path to this problem requires us performing a rather complex
calculation. In order to facilitate the problem we can use an "anchor". 216% is rather
close to 200%, and calculating 200% of 350 is an easier task:

200% of 350 = 350x2 = 700. Now we have an "anchor" – 700, and we can compare it
to the answer choices and to decide which of them is the correct answer using
estimations. We know that the correct answer must be a little bit more than 700.
Option A is lower than 700, thus immediately eliminated. We can estimate that
option B is too near to 700, and option D is too far from 700, therefore the correct
answer must be option C. As mentioned above, even though the calculation is not
complete, the estimation enables an educated guess, and we can mark option C and
move forward to the next question.

Just to clear your mind, 216% of 350 are indeed 756 .